The comparisons have been going on since Hotel California was first released in '76 - from Ultimate Classic Rock:
" 'We Used To Know'...a featured song from Tull's 1969 album 'Stand Up' -- and a track that Anderson said bears an unmistakable resemblance to one of the Eagles' best-known subsequent hits.
"Maybe it was just something they kind of picked up on subconsciously, and introduced that chord sequence into their famous song 'Hotel California' sometime later," Anderson adds.
Similarities do, in fact, exist in the chord structure, as well as the lead vocal melody. Both songs also fade out with a musical jam of sorts. (At least one well-done mashup makes the connection clearer.)
There are, however, marked differences in tempo. Jethro Tull takes things noticeably slower. "It's just the same chord sequence," Anderson says. "It's in a different time signature, different key, different context.
And it's a very, very fine song that they wrote, so I can't feel anything other than a sense of happiness for their sake. And I feel flattered that they came across that chord sequence.
But it's difficult to find a chord sequence that hasn't been used, and hasn't been the focus of lots of pieces of music." As such, the diplomatic Anderson says he holds no ill will toward the Eagles.
"There's certainly no bitterness or any sense of plagiarism attached to my view on it," he says, "although I do sometimes allude, in a joking way, to accepting it as a kind of tribute."
Jethro Tull_____________________________________________________________Rip this joint, gonna save your soul, round and round and round we go......